Beautiful Things
by SouthSideStory
Summary: I still have my trident. I refused to part with it because it was my salvation in the arena, the icon of my victory, the gift that brought me home. Now I keep it to remind myself of a hard earned lesson. Nothing is free, love least of all.
1. The Price of Sugar

**CHAPTER ONE**

 **The Price of Sugar**

* * *

I still have my trident. By the time the hovercraft came I'd been holding it for almost a week, and no Capitol lackey was brave enough to pry it from my hands. Even after I returned to District Four I refused to part with it. Because it was my salvation in the arena, the icon of my victory, the gift that brought me home.

Now I keep it to remind myself of a hard earned lesson. Nothing is free, love least of all.

* * *

Mama spoons sweet potato hash over hot yellow rice. First on Dad's plate, then everyone else's. She takes the little that's left for herself. Later today I'll be feasting on the best the Capitol has to offer, but I think their chefs could still learn a thing or two from my mother. I tell her so, and she swats my arm.

"You're full of it, Finnick," Mama says, smiling.

"Is there brown sugar in this?" I ask.

"There is. Thanks to you." She gives me a fond kiss on the temple, and if I could still blush I might. I wish she wouldn't say things like that. My winnings bought the sugar, and it's hard to forget what bought my winnings.

Of course, they had money before I won the Games. Children aren't cheap, and families are paid well for giving them up.

"How do our volunteers look?" Rordan asks.

A hush falls across the table. Mute mother anger to my right, uncomfortable quiet everywhere else. Except my older brother, smug and expectant.

"You know I can't talk about that," I say.

"Right. Sorry. It's such a big secret and all."

Pearl puts her pale hand on my brother's arm, same as Mama does when Dad says too much. That must be every wife's gentle way of telling her husband to shut the hell up.

My sister's youngest son starts crying. Short, hiccupping sobs that somehow make the sullen silence in the room ring louder. Nessa bounces the baby and gives him her finger to suck on. Thick tears slip down his fat cheeks, clear and diamond bright. My littlest nephew is maybe a year old but for the life of me I can't remember whether they call him Manny or Mally.

"We'll have more of the Games than we want soon enough," Dad says. "Let's keep it away from the breakfast table."

"Sorry," Rordan says again, and this time he actually sounds it.

Talk turns to quotas and whether Angler's, the only bar in town, is gonna close. Peacekeepers have been raiding, and Old Tam's business has all but died. This is news to me; I rarely leave Victor's Village these days.

"It's a damn shame," Rordan says. "'Scuse my language and all, but Tam's a good man. I hate to see him lose his place."

"Why are the Peacekeepers raiding?" I ask.

My brother gives me a level look. "Because that's what they do. Get in our business when they're not wrecking it."

"Rordan," Dad says, warning. Dark eyes flash in my direction, and I understand. He doesn't want to talk freely in front of me.

"I'm not bugged," I say. "Though the house probably is." Let Snow's eavesdroppers choke on that.

Pearl laughs, but it's forced, too high and too bright to be real. "You're so funny," she says. Underneath the table her foot nudges mine. Not unlike the quieting touch she just gave my brother. Except this is harder and less loving and out of sight.

Just to fuck with Rordan, I give Pearl the kind of slow smile that invariably flusters women. In this, if not most ways, my sister-in-law is unexceptional. Pink colors her cheeks, and for a moment all I can think is how different things might be right now if Dad hadn't handed me over to Mags for a sack of denarii. Seven children wouldn't have died for this breakfast, and Pearl might be my wife instead of Rordan's.

"I should get moving," I say.

"Already?" Mama asks. "But you've barely touched your food."

"Let the boy go," Dad says, and I wonder how old I'll have to get before he stops calling me that.

Outside, salt spray stings the air, and I can smell the ocean even if I can't see it. My parents' new house sits further inland than the home I grew up in, closer to town than not. I run to the water. Sand pulls at my feet, and the feeling takes me back to summers on the beach. Building castles with Rordan and watching the high tide swallow them whole. Patching the roof with Dad, though that one leaking spot never did get fixed. Selling trinkets to Capitol tourists too stupid to know their worth.

Waves roll in, green rushing to white seafoam. I strip down to nothing but undershorts and wade through the shallows. Gritty sea bottom bites into my bare feet. I shouldn't get my hair wet so close to showtime, but no one will care besides Licinia. My clients might even like it. When the water rises to my chest I turn away from the sun, lean back and let the ocean buoy me. Cloudless blue above me, around me. Featherlight, I'm floating on the one thing I used to think nobody could own. Now I know better. You can own anything for the right price.

Paper for sons. Blood for sugar. Snow must be living well off the exchange rate in District Four.

* * *

Varinia Bain, Four's Capitol escort, finds me hiding from the cameras in the Justice Building kitchen.

"What are you doing down here? We have to be on stage in ten minutes," she says.

I point to the crackling television in the corner. "They're calling the boy from Three now." He looks a bit like Beetee. Ashen, bespectacled, awkward. I can only hope for my tribute's sake that Graft Simmons isn't half as clever as his mentor.

"I haven't had time to catch the reapings," Varinia says, part reproach and part jealousy. "Tell me about the other Careers."

"The usual from Two. Built like bulls, both of them." I add three sugar cubes to my coffee and watch white dissolve into black. It does little to fend off the bitterness. "District One is something else. The girl looks sly."

And the male tribute reminds me of myself. Older, though, than I was when I volunteered. Age aside, I see the worst of myself in One's boy. Pretty on the surface and empty enough beneath to shape into whatever the Capitol wants. It's not difficult to guess what angle Cashmere and Gloss are going to go with him. Beautiful, desired, beloved.

Better if he never makes it past the Cornucopia.

"I guess I'll see for myself soon. But now, we need to go!" Varinia says, her sibilant accent growing stronger with impatience. "The Capitol is waiting for its favorite victor."

I want to correct her. To say I wait on the Capitol, not the other way around. Instead, I unbutton my shirt and rumple my hair. Smile, wider and brighter, until I no longer feel like myself. There. Camera ready.

I follow Varinia outside. The summer sun burns more white than gold, over bright in an empty blue sky. Hot, even for a reaping. Children are corralled in the square, sweaty and resentful, packed as close as livestock. The Eighteens stand nearest the stage, old fear and new hope showing plain on their young faces.

I take my place beside Mags. Front and center, still smiling. The children don't smile back.

Mayor Omalley opens his mouth and President Snow's words crawl out. Treason and tributes and games.

There's a boy in the front row—tall, dark-haired, and lean, but as strong as the oxen-in-armor District Two cranks out every year, reliable and deadly as winter. Nethan Segara: tribute trained since age ten, good with knives, better with a spear, and this year's volunteer. He isn't my concern though; Mags always mentors the boys.

Varinia's lacquered nails _tap tap tap_ through the mayor's speech, fingers just itching to pluck a name from that cage of paper slips. When she finally gets her hand in the reaping ball, she calls, "Susely Laguna!"

Before Susely can step forward, Annie Cresta volunteers. She walks out from the group of Eighteens, tall for her age but slender, dark-haired and brown-skinned. Pretty enough, in a common sort of way. (I've seen her before, of course. All of the District Four victors visit the training camp from time to time, to check out the tributes we'll soon be responsible for.) She strides forward, straight-backed and steady. Professionally calm, the way she's been trained to appear at this moment.

On to the boys, then. I'm still watching Annie, only half-listening to the drawing (Palo Lopaz, sixteen, short and skinny and on the verge of tears). I'm thankful for Nethan's confidence and strength, Career through and through. He'll probably be dead within the month, but at least Palo will get to live a full life—as full as life gets in the districts, anyway.

Peacekeepers escort Nethan to the stage, but it's not necessary. He rushes to reach us.

"Two volunteers!" says Varinia, as if this is a surprise. "The Capitol applauds your bravery. Now, do tell all of Panem who District Four's new tribute is," she prompts.

Nethan says his name into the microphone, but the boy isn't looking at Varinia or me, the Capitol cameras or the people of Four.

His eyes are for Annie alone.

* * *

From their dark skin and accents, I can tell that our tributes are from the south-district, the only place in Four where nearly everyone depends on tesserae to get by. Most of the kids who have been reaped since my victory were southerners from large, hungry families. Scrawny boys and girls who looked half their age, almost as underfed as Twelve's cadaverous tributes.

Annie swirls a blueberry scone in the crème brulee. Varinia, showing rare tact, has the grace to save etiquette lessons for later. But then Nethan double dips a roll in the table's gravy boat and she says, "Pardon me, I have paperwork to see to…" Then she flutters to her room as quickly as her heels will allow.

"Gravy?" Nethan asks me, cool as you please. That's when I know they're provoking us on purpose, but I don't bite. I thank the boy and accept the dish.

Enough fun at my expense. We have other games to discuss.

"So how old were you when your parents sold you?" I ask Annie.

She swallows, brown cheeks flushed pink, then says, "Nine."

That's typical. The younger a tribute trainee is recruited, the better. "Big family?" I ask.

Annie's mouth is full of cookies now, so Nethan answers for her. "Very. Six sisters and another on the way soon."

"You know each other well?" I say it like a question, even though it's not.

"Yeah." Annie smiles at Nethan, if weakly, and I realize that she's actually quite lovely. Too unpolished for Capitol standards, but she has the sort of face you'll never forget. That will linger behind closed eyelids when you sleep.

Not that I need any more tributes haunting my nights. I see them writhing beneath my net like so many fish. Seven speared on my trident, blood welling around all that fine Capitol steel. Killed by love, I think, every time I meet one of my sponsors. Two more, shipped back home in plain pine boxes: victims of my failed mentorship if not my hand, and just as dead for all the difference that makes. Eighteen-year-olds (Esta Berringer and Piera Desanto), unlucky and unwanted. Children with too many siblings and too little to feed them, sold to save their little brothers and sisters, like Annie.

"Then you're friends?" I ask Nethan.

Maybe he senses my disapproval, but it doesn't cow him. "So what?" he asks, stubborn, defiant.

"Friendship doesn't fare well in the Hunger Games," I say. "You might both be fighting for District Four, but at the end of the day you're each other's competition."

"Better to have a friend by your side than to go in alone," Nethan says.

 _You're always alone in the arena, you idiot_.

"He's not my competition," Annie says, still looking at her plate. Half full with Capitol delicacies, but she's no longer eating. "I'll protect him, and he'll protect me. I wouldn't expect you to understand."

Her soft accusation stings in a way that Nethan's bluster couldn't touch. She looks at me with sea green eyes, the same color as mine, but distant. That faraway gaze asks who I love enough to risk my life for. There are people Snow holds over my head, family and friends I debase myself to keep alive, but that's not quite the same. Whoring can't kill you, though there are times I think it might.

Who would you die for, Finnick Odair? The answer is sad and selfish and pleasing to the Capitol, just like the rest of me.

But I'm a mentor now, and my life isn't under threat. Annie's is, so I better focus on saving her.

Mags comes in without knocking and takes a seat beside Nethan. She doesn't ask our tributes whether they want to be trained together or separately. Mags never needs to ask questions like that because she always knows the answers.

"Stand up, both of you," she says. "Lunch is over. Let's get a look at what we have to work with."

Nethan looks irritated, Annie wary, but they leave their chairs just the same.

It takes about thirty seconds of inspection to assure us that they're as fit as Career tributes should be. Though a year younger than me, Nethan can look me in the eye, and when I grasp his bicep he jumps a little but doesn't protest. Good muscle tone for an eighteen-year-old boy as lanky as he is.

Mags asks, straightforward, "Do you like to fight?"

"Yes," he says, and there's heat behind that one word. "My dad's sister was reaped for the Fiftieth Games. He trained me even before I was sent to the camp."

I don't have to ask whether his aunt is a victor or a corpse. Only Haymitch came out of the slaughter that was the second Quarter Quell. And if memory serves, he killed _both_ of District Four's female tributes over the course of his Games.

"Tell me about your weapon skills," Mags says.

"I can handle any kind of spear," he says proudly. "Not as good with a throwing knife as Annie is, but my aim's still excellent, and my hand-to-hand combat is good even if my opponent is bigger than me."

This tallies with the reports I've read from his trainers. Mags nods, and we turn to Annie.

"Are you as good with a knife as he says, or is your boyfriend talking you up?" I ask.

She looks uncomfortable, either with my assumption about Nethan or my challenge to her skills. "I never miss when I throw. Never. And I'm good with a lance. Not as strong as Nethan, though, so I don't have his range." Annie breathes deep, fidgets with the blue sea glass pendant around her neck. "But I—I don't like to kill things." Her hands flit to her ears, covering them.

If you won't defend yourself in the arena, you're dead already. But there's a world of difference between hating to kill and refusing to do it. Still, I wonder why the trainers selected Annie if she doesn't take to violence.

Gently, I tug her hands from over her ears. Then I cradle Annie's face between my palms, tilt it toward the chandelier light to get a better look.

You can see the south in Annie in a way that doesn't show as prominently in Nethan. She's darker than him, with fuller lips and brown curls that fall, thick and flowing, to the small of her back. I can already imagine what the stylists will do with hair like that. Smooth it down, bring out the shine, but they won't cut it or tame it. The rest of her appears almost fragile, she needs something to look wild when she faces the judgement of Capitol cameras.

"You're very pretty," I say, and for once the flattery coming out of my mouth is based in truth.

"What does that matter?" Nethan asks.

"Appearance means everything to the Capitol," says Mags, in a tone that brooks no argument.

"If it didn't, I wouldn't be standing here," I say.

"Does that bother you?" Annie asks.

"What do you mean?"

My hands are still cupping her face, and when she speaks, I can feel her words before I hear them. "You didn't survive because you were the smartest or the strongest or the best trained," she says—then adds, "Not that you weren't all of those things. You were, I remember. But you won because you're so…" Here she hesitates, and warmth blooms under my fingers as her cheeks flush. "Beautiful. Because you were most loved."

"Why would that bother me?" I ask. "Everyone wants to be loved."

"Yes, but not by people you don't love back."

No one speaks this honestly to me, not anymore, and I've been spouting lies for so long that I have trouble responding to the truth.

"What makes you think I don't? My sponsors saved my life." Bugs crawl all over this train, hiding behind lights, under floorboards, and the last thing I need is Snow breathing down my neck for talking treason with the tributes. I have to diffuse this conversation before it hits dangerous territory. And frankly, just because I want to see Annie blush again, I pitch my voice lower, adopting the suggestive tone that makes my patrons spill their secrets. "Wouldn't _you_ love someone who brought you home?"

She laughs at my innuendo. As if falling for Capitol pet Finnick Odair is the silliest thing she's ever heard. And I suppose for a girl like her, it is. "Get me out of the arena and we'll see," she teases, smiling brightly. Now I have to amend my previous assessment of her looks. Not pretty, beautiful.

There, that's her angle. Sponsors would rain gifts on Annie if they saw her like this. Uninhibited, shyness dispelled, new and lovely as spring. But then I recall that the only thing the Capitol values about purity is its corruption. And I know, better than anyone, what President Snow does with beautiful things.

* * *

 **Author's Notes:** So this is the beginning of my Odesta multi-chap that's been sitting on my Google drive for… longer than I care to admit. ;) This story is a sequel to Fishers of Men, but it's not necessary to have read FoM to understand Beautiful Things.

This fic will contain scenes of rape, and Finnick dealing with the psychological repercussions of his sexual abuse will be present throughout the whole story.

Many thanks to trovia for her beta work on this chapter!


	2. Pieces

**CHAPTER TWO**

 **Pieces**

* * *

Beneath her ridiculous makeup—pin straight hair streaked black and crimson, skin bleached porcelain white, lips dyed scarlet—Varinia Bain is actually an attractive woman. Pouty mouth and delicate nose and sparkling dark eyes set in picture perfect proportions on her heart-shaped face. Her features naturally possess the sort of symmetry and balance Capitol women beggar themselves to attain with surgical simulation.

Not that beauty has any value beyond what people will pay to possess it. I'm proof enough of that.

"Can you believe our luck this year?" Varinia asks. She plucks off her earrings and flings them into a tray. "Our girl is too skinny and the boy is hot-headed. I bet Ophelia's never had a reaping this disappointing..."

Poor, pretty Varinia lusts after Ophelia Edgecombe's escort position like a bitch in heat, but I try not to hold it against her. District Two does boast the greatest number of victors, and losing is antithetical to Varinia's nature.

"Don't worry so much," I say, trying to soothe. "It's too early to tell what kind of tributes we have."

Then I stretch across the bed in a way that tightens the muscles in my stomach and brings my ribs into sharp peaks. Her expression softens.

"Not true." She smiles, then, and toes out of her heels. "I could tell from the moment you volunteered that you were a victor."

This statement is two parts exaggeration to one part truth, but I don't contest it. "Really? What tipped you off?"

Her jacket drops to the floor. "I knew sponsors would do anything to bring a boy like you home. Cost becomes trivial when you discover something priceless."

I laugh. "Priceless? Someone should tell President Snow. He could up my hourly rate."

I wouldn't risk such a statement around most of my clients, who prefer to pretend that I want them, but Varinia gets off on buying me as much as the sex itself. Being reminded of the bargain never bothers her.

It takes a full five minutes for her to undress. Layers are in this season. Naked except for her mask of makeup, she finally joins me on the bed.

It's probably unprofessional for a mentor to fuck their Capitol escort, and if the Games had any ethical boundaries this might even be against the rules. When I said as much to Snow last year, he just smiled, flashing white teeth smeared with red. With a flick of his tongue the blood disappeared, and he said, "But Miss Bain worked so hard to make you a victor. It seems only fair that she be rewarded for her efforts. And what better way than by enjoying what she helped to create?"

So when she kisses me, I open my mouth. And when she touches me, I lean into her hands. Willing, exposed, the image of love. Because this is who I am now. This is what they've made me.

* * *

Baths feel like I'm stewing in my own filth instead of washing it off, so I always shower after a date. No matter who it's with or where I am, as soon as we're done I scald myself in the hottest water I can stand. Depending on how busy my schedule is, I might shower three or four times a day.

It's almost funny: I'm cleanest in the Capitol, the place where I feel nothing but dirty, inside and out.

After Varinia is finished with me I choose a handful of soaps (rosemary, passionfruit, wildflower, peach) and the most brutal jets of water that the train shower offers. I'm going to smell like something between a funeral and a fruitcake, but it's hard to give a shit just now. Maybe it will even turn off my next patron.

My hair is still wet when Mags finds me in the bar car, downing doubles of a dark green whiskey. Flakes of real silver swim in my shot glass, bright even in the murky liquor. She doesn't ask how I'm doing or if I'm well. She doesn't try to hug me or hold my hand. Mags knows what not to say and when not to touch. Lately, that seems to be anything and always.

"Don't get drunk," she warns. Then orders one rum and black soda for herself.

"I know my limit," I say, and knock back the last shot. Thick, sour, clotted with shards of precious metal. Penance for the mouth.

Mags sips her mixed rum. Slowly, measured, same as she speaks and walks and plans. Then she turns to me, and her faded eyes are sharp. "I'll look after her when you're out."

I nod, and wish I could take the bottle of green whiskey back to my room. Just drink myself through the Games, like Haymitch. But I can't, for two reasons. The first is on this train and the other waits for me in the Capitol.

"We can get one of them home if we do this right," Mags says, and I want to ask how she can stand to mentor after six decades. Look at children on their way to the slaughter and find hope that, at best, you can make a murderer out of a young boy or girl. This is only my third year, and the fourth daughter of my district whose fate I hold in my hands, and already I don't think I can stand it. Annie Cresta is kind and shy and full of quiet strength. These Games will ruin her, probably kill her. And I'll have to watch it all in perfect definition from my screen in the mentors' station.

Mags touches my cheek, and I realize that I'm shaking all over and my face is wet. A wreck before the opening ceremonies even start. That's got to be some kind of record.

"It's all right," she says. "You'll be all right, Finnick."

That's a lie, but lovingly meant, so I try my best to believe it.

* * *

Licinia, my stylist, bitches about the salt damage to my hair and the tan lines she expressly forbade me from developing.

"Sun is good for your brand," she says, "but a District Eleven tan isn't! How many times do I have to tell you? If you want to keep from looking like a farmer, just take it all off before you go swimming."

The preps rub lotion onto my chest, arms, legs, groin. Evening me out.

"This will have to do for now," she says, "but you'll need spot sunning tomorrow."

"I'm sorry, Kinny." She hates it when I call her that. "I don't know how I could have forgotten."

Licinia purses her lips and tells Aelia and Balbinus to rub harder. It feels a little like being tenderized.

At least she doesn't bleach my teeth anymore. Not since a tabloid made fun of the blue-white sheen my smile had taken on under her styling.

After this, they dress me—in tight black pants and a shirt that reveals more of my chest than it covers—and send me off to do my job.

My date for the tributes' parade is a relic from the Dark Days named Servilia Whisper. Richer than Snow and older than god, she has been lifted, tucked, and stuffed until her skin is unusually smooth and overly shiny. Ageless as plastic. She clings to my arm in a way that reminds me of seaweed. Or vines.

I'm not the only one in the victor's box with Capitol company. Last year's winner, Calico Werther, is entertaining a woman old enough to be her mother, and Senator Quintillus Swift has Cashmere on one arm and Gloss on the other.

I loosen Servilia's grip on my bicep under the pretext of sweeping a chivalrous kiss across her knuckles. She giggles like a schoolgirl, but the skin beneath my lips is crinkled and over soft. It's strange, kissing someone with a girl's face and an old woman's hands.

"What a gentlemen," she says, husky and quiet.

"What a lady," I return.

Below us, the chariots are just coming into view. The Ones look beautiful but fierce, the Twos as stony as their costumes. Wire-wrapped Threes appear more uncomfortable than anything. Then there's ours. Much as I hate Vibius, he's done a fantastic job on Annie. No mermaids this year; he's made her a siren. Regal and strong, that long hair streaming down her back. A queen of the deep draped in seafoam cloth that flows over the long, lean lines of her body.

"A thousand denarii says your girl faints before the parade is over."

Cashmere is always a bitch at the beginning of the Games.

I gesture toward One's tributes, dripping with sheer silk and little else. "I see you're continuing your district's finest tradition: making pretty things for the Capitol to play with."

"Fuck you," Cashmere hisses, quiet enough for our patrons to miss.

Smiling, I turn back to Servilia. I tell her what a lovely ring she's wearing, and she promises to buy one for me that will complement hers. It's almost a game, seeing what gems I can pry out of my clients. And I'm good at games.

Beside me, I hear Senator Swift tell Cashmere to hold Gloss' hand, and I wish I hadn't said a word about pretty playthings from District One.

After the parade, Servilia takes me to dinner. Paparazzi follow us all the way to the restaurant, then camp out by the entrances, waiting for us to leave. I order two appetizers, the biggest entree on the menu, then three desserts. Servilia catches on and demands one of everything on the menu. For a moment, I have fun, sampling roast duck and chocolate mousse, things sweet and savory to the tongue, until we're so full it hurts. Some young journalist tries to take our picture through a window. We wave at him, and Servilia laughs with me. By the time we leave, half the vultures are gone and the rest are too bored and resentful to catch anything worthy of the front page.

It's a long night at Servilia's apartment, though. I'm tired from this never-ending day. The last thing I want to do is fuck, but my wants are immaterial here.

After, she looks at me with old eyes in her smooth face and says, "Thank you, Finnick. You made me feel young again."

"You did the same for me," I say.

She laughs and swats my arm. "You _are_ young, silly."

"I know, but sometimes I don't feel that way."

Her grin falters. "Because of this, you mean?"

"Tonight was wonderful," I say. And really, compared to an evening with Cicero Franklin, it almost was. "But not all of my dates are like you."

Servilia wipes away the wetness that's gathering at the corners of her eyes. I help, and she gives me a watery smile. "You're so sweet. That's why I wanted to meet you. Not your looks, that wasn't it. I thought that if I could have a night with you, then maybe I wouldn't feel so…"

She struggles for the word, but I know it right away. "Alone."

"Yes," Servilia says. "I didn't want to be alone."

* * *

Annie is still awake when I get in. She's sitting cross-legged on the floor, stirring a cup of hot chocolate with a peppermint stick and playing checkers with our Avox. The young man jumps when I open the door. Caught red-handed playing a game the bugs won't pick up. Silent, because one player has no tongue and the other prefers quiet to conversation.

Annie's heavy-lidded eyes go wide. She puts a solitary finger to her lips and shakes her head at me. _Don't talk_.

I take a seat on the couch and watch their game unfold. Annie is red, her opponent black. She's never played before, but our Avox takes time to teach her. For instruction without words he does well, and by their third round Annie is crowning more kings than he has pieces. She's a fast learner, then, and smart.

I wish I could stop evaluating. In a few days' time I'll likely be watching this sweet girl die. The least she deserves is for me to look at her like a person instead of a tribute.

After our Avox returns to the kitchen—tired of being beaten by a beginner, I guess—I take the seat across from Annie. The carpet is plush and soft, almost as comfortable as the loveseat I abandoned. She asks if I want to play, but I shake my head. I can tell just from watching that she'd beat me. I really only have two skill sets, and checkerboards aren't typically found in arenas or between sheets.

"Where were you?" she asks.

"On a date."

I wait for scorn or judgment, maybe even tears. Last year, Piera cried when I came home late for the third night in a row, certain that I couldn't take care of her during the Games. Justified fear, of course, since she was stabbed in the neck by Calico at the Cornucopia. But Annie doesn't even look up from the board. She's tapping each plastic disc in turn. Once she's touched them all, she laughs.

"Did you know that checkers and the Hunger Games use the same number of pieces?"

A quick count reveals that she's right. Twenty-four little tributes arranged against each other, twelve red and twelve black.

* * *

Ever accommodating, the Capitol provides a barroom in the basement of the Training Center.

"Just for me," Haymitch says, before he knocks back a shot of something strong and honey colored. After three of those he smells like a hot toddy, and there's no longer a tremble in his drinking arm. Twelve's tributes are thirteen and fourteen this year. Scrawny kids, scared shitless. Soaking wet and put together they might weigh as much as Two's girl, Vita, but only if she doesn't eat for the next week.

I order a frozen, peachy drink too sweet to taste the liquor in. Haymitch smiles and shakes his head, but he doesn't remark upon my choice.

It's Annie and Nethan's first day of training, and I've got sponsor mixers lined up all afternoon, but the morning is mine. So I'm spending it here, with the closest thing to family I have these days. To my left, Cashmere and Gloss are splitting a small bottle of absinthe. Next to them, Calico cries into her flamingo pink daiquiri. Last night, in her mini-skirt and makeup, she looked older than nineteen. Today she seems younger. As young as Annie.

I order a second drink.

"Have a fun night with Whisper?" Gloss asks me.

"Could have been worse. She's very generous." I hold up my hand so he can see the silver and onyx ring that Servilia sent to the District Four quarters this morning.

Gloss laughs coolly. "You're really something, you know that, Odair?"

"That's what they keep telling me. How was the Senator?"

Cashmere snorts and says, "Couldn't get it up. No wonder his wife sleeps with half the city."

"Maybe he'll ask Snow for a refund." Not if he's smart, of course.

"No," Gloss says, and now his voice is flat and even. "He got his money's worth."

"Oh. Sorry." There's really nothing else I can say to that.

Chaff stumbles over from Seeder and Bran's table to throw his arms around me and Haymitch. "Happy Hunger Games," he says.

Every victor at the bar raises their glass, except for Calico.

I wonder if she'd ever slept with a woman before last night. If she'd ever slept with anyone at all. I hadn't. Snow gave me to Cicero Franklin at the end of my Victory Tour, just two weeks short of my fifteenth birthday. With his kind eyes and cruel hands, he taught me more about the violence of men in one night than I had learned from seventeen days in the arena.

"Finnick?" asks Haymitch. "You in there?" He leans closer, brings whiskey fumes into the space between us, but he doesn't grab or shake me. Victors know better than that.

"Yeah. I'm here," I say. Even though I wasn't.

"You all right, kid?"

Beneath the sarcasm, Haymitch has a caring streak, and it's showing. I can't take that. Being looked after means you're broken, and I don't have time to break right now.

I say, "Fine. Better than Calico," and indicate down the bar. She's not crying anymore. Just staring at her daiquiri like she wants to take a broadsword to it.

"Bullshit," Haymitch drawls. His accent gets stronger the longer he drinks. "You two're in the same boat. And Snow's steering the sonofabitch."

I laugh. One of the best things about Haymitch is that he has an admirable disregard for the president's bugs. Fuck you, he says, with every other breath, and hopes Snow is listening. Maybe that's the single perk to having nothing left to lose. Freedom, as much as you can ever grasp of it in this place.

I track down Lyme and Decimus to discuss an alliance with Two. I'd rather not have any part of One this year, but that wish is unlikely to be granted. Districts One and Two have been in bed together since the Tenth Games, when volunteering was introduced. Four is the newcomer in the Career pack, as I'm reminded every year.

"Your girl looks like dead weight," Decimus says flatly, "but we'll take the boy."

"Not happening," I say. "Mags and I are training the tributes together this year. They're a package deal."

Lyme gives me a hard look. "And we can't negotiate that?"

"No. Besides, Annie's hell with a throwing knife and clever too. It would be a mistake to leave her out of the pack."

"Fine. If Vita and Crispin can back that up, then she's in."

Decimus looks like he wants to argue that decision, but Lyme boasts Brutus and Enobaria as evidence of her mentoring skills, so his opinion isn't the one that matters.

"Deal," I say, and we shake hands.

I don't know what Annie does in training, but by dinner a half-dozen mentors approach me with alliance offers. First Lyme, who confirms that our agreement stands. Then Cashmere and Gloss to seal the traditional One-Two-Four pack. Those I expected. But what I don't see coming is Waverly Jones, District Five victor of the Sixtieth Games, telling me that her Petra wants to work with Annie. Or Haymitch, in his gruff way, offering Twelve's male tribute as an ally for my girl.

Even though she's in with the other Careers, I find Annie in her room and tell her all the options.

She frowns and says, "Do I have to go with the Ones and Twos?"

"Why wouldn't you want to?"

Annie pulls her feet up to the bed and rests her crossed arms on her knees. "I like Petra and Rolly. I might actually be able to trust them to have my back in the arena, and I don't think I can say that for Vita or Jasper."

I shake my head and take a seat next to her on the bed. "Alliances aren't friendships. They're not about who you like or who you trust, because you can't trust anyone in the arena, and liking your opponents only makes them harder to kill. You choose your allies based on one thing only."

"What's that?" Annie asks, leaning closer.

"Simple," I say. "Who's going to keep you alive the longest."

* * *

 **Author's Notes:** The lovely trovia did beta work for most of this chapter too, which I am very grateful for.


	3. Fault Lines

**CHAPTER THREE**

 **Fault Lines**

* * *

Mags smiles, and the wrinkles across her cheeks and forehead meet. It looks like her whole face is frowning, except her mouth. "Your turn," she says. "For all the good it will do."

"What do you mean?"

She laughs. "They're stubborn and they think they know everything. Like most children."

"They're only a year younger than me," I say.

"You're still a kid too, Finnick," Mags says.

"Thanks, mentor. Very helpful."

Mags is too used to my irreverence to be bothered by it. She waves me off and goes to her room, probably for a nap. Now all I have to do is give our tributes life-saving advice.

"Your strategy needs to be adaptable, because the arena could be anything from a desert to a jungle," I tell them. "Focus on the elements you know. You're in the Career pack, but what are you going to do to stay in it? Or leave, when the time is right?"

"That's easy," says Nethan. "We make ourselves useful enough to keep, and when the field thins out we remove the biggest threat."

"Then get out," Annie adds. "Quick."

There are so many holes in that plan that I'm not sure where to start. What are they teaching cadets at the training camp these days? I shake my head. "First of all, there's no 'we' in the arena. Stick too close together and the Gamemakers will make you pay for it. And you'll probably look suspicious to the Ones and Twos."

Annie fiddles with a knife, not looking at me, and Nethan stares at the wall over my shoulder. I need them to listen more closely. I need them to care about what I have to say. "Everyone's loyal to their district partner—"

"Not everyone," Nethan says, but what he means is, _Not you_.

No, not me, and now I see _her_ : Minnow, whose darting, quicksilver movements recalled her namesake. Trapped in the tangle of my net. The trident took her in the stomach, tines sinking through soft girl flesh, and I twisted until her blood flowed like wine at a Capitol dinner. Except the Capitol's cups never go dry and Minnow did. But first she thrashed and cried, fingers scrambling over the three wounds where red life leaked out, trying to hold it in. All I could think was how like a fish she looked, this girl called Minnow, flopping around on the end of my trident. And I laughed. Laughed until I made myself sick, vomiting up the remains of warm bread, fresh fruit, salted meat. Sponsor gifts all, of course.

No matter that she was older, taller, stronger than me. That Minnow had prepared for seven years, while I'd only been trained for two. District Four has had little love for me since the day I killed one of their daughters, one of my own, and laughed while she bled.

"True. Not everyone." I give Nethan my best Capitol smile and say, "Still, most players will put their district partner before the other tributes, but that sort of loyalty only goes so far in the arena. And if you show a front that's too united the pack might fear betrayal."

This was some of the first advice Mags gave me. As with most things concerning the Games, she was right.

"And if that happens, District One _will_ stab you in the back."

"One?" Annie asks. "Not Two?"

"Two is brutal," I say. "In a straightforward fight they're the last tributes you want to face, but the people of One spend their lives learning to meet the Capitol's every whim. Nobody more so than the Careers. They know politicsthe way you know the water. So don't give them any reason to suspect you're friends."

We talk strategy for a full hour, and then I dismiss Nethan. Once we're alone, I say to Annie, "You know you're not both going to make it out of the arena."

"Of course I know that," she says. "I'm not stupid, and I understand how the Games work."

"Look, I want the two of you to support each other in there. You'll be stronger if you have one another's backs," I say, "but I'm your mentor, not Nethan's, and it's my job to get you out of these Games alive. So I've got to tell you now that you need to distance yourself from him a little. Because if you go into the arena like this, you're going to be devastated when he dies."

"I'm not wasting our last days together by _distancing_ myself," Annie says. "Besides, you and I both know that Nethan's the one who's going to survive. Not me."

"Why do you say that?" I ask.

She fidgets with the hem of her shirt and whispers, "He's stronger. Always has been."

"I think you're underestimating yourself. You survived nine years at the training camp, and you were chosen above every other female cadet in your year to fight in these Games. That's something." When I put my hand on her shoulder, she jumps a little under my touch. The contact was meant to be comforting, but Annie blushes, and I realize I've only flustered her.

Maybe it should irritate me that my tribute has a crush on me, but for some reason it doesn't.

* * *

My second date of the day falls between meetings with District Four's past sponsors. So throughout my lunch with Felix Bembridge (a green-haired young man from old money), I go over my next conversation in my head. Planning how to best butter up Iulia Pavlovich and get her to part with her denarii for the third year in a row. This is a little tedious, but still more pleasant than listening to Felix, who drones on about his volunteer work with the Capitol Zoological Society.

"There are actually people who want to have the Games mutts put down after the victor is crowned," Felix says, shaking his head. "Have you ever heard of anything so inhumane?"

It takes all of my discipline not to roll my eyes. Instead, I smile brightly and say, "It's a good thing those animals have you around to help protect them."

After lunch, Felix takes me back to his apartment—a loft in the City Circle that probably costs more money to rent per month than I've seen in my life. It's sleek and white and meticulously clean, the furniture square and stiff, and it reminds me of a very luxurious hospital. Except there are more windows than walls, and Felix doesn't seem to believe in blinds.

"Would you like a drink?" he asks. "I have bourbon, white wine, rum…"

I make myself comfortable on the couch and say, "Wine." Something to take the edge off feels like a necessity today, but I don't dare drink anything harder. I need to keep my wits about me for my sponsor meeting after this.

I don't get a chance to drink my wine because no sooner than Felix sits beside me, his lips are on mine and his hands are all over my body, greedy and groping. The familiar sense of fear settles like lead in my stomach, even as I lean into his touch. When he sticks his tongue in my mouth, I force myself to stop dreading what's going to happen next, to focus on what I'm going to say to Iulia in a few hours. It's no good, though, because when he tells me to suck him off, all I can think about are those curtainless windows. Anyone could walk by, could see, could take a photo.

"Don't you want to go somewhere more private?" I ask.

"You district boys really are so modest. It's adorable," Felix says, laughing.

"I'm glad you find me amusing." I mean to sound flirtatious, but my temper gets the best of me and the words come out harder than intended.

Felix's smile extinguishes. "The president's clerk promised you'd show me a good time. That you'd do whatever I want."

I have to salvage this somehow. An unhappy patron means an unhappy Snow, and that isn't an option.

"I'm sorry for being rude. Let me make it up to you." I touch his cheek, drag my fingers down his jaw, his neck, and undo the top button of his shirt.

Felix remains stony-faced, unmoved by my charms, but now there's a flicker of desire in his pale eyes. "Get on your knees," he orders. "I'm not going to tell you again."

* * *

Some industrious photographer got a picture of me blowing Felix, and by six o'clock it's all over the rag mags and the gossip channels. At least my face and his groin are purposely pixelated beyond recognition. (Even the Capitol is above blasting uncensored pornography across primetime television.) Still, I can tell from Nethan's unforgiving stare and Annie's refusal to meet my eyes that they both saw it.

I wonder if it made the news back home in District Four. If my father got to see his youngest son kneeling before a Capitol man and felt justified in selling me to Mags seven years ago.

I go to my room as soon as I can, ready for this damn day to be over, but Varinia wakes me in the middle of the night. I turn on the lamp, scowling and pissed off because this is the first real sleep I've gotten in over forty-eight hours and she just interrupted it.

I look at the clock and see that the red digital numbers read 3:13 a.m. "What the hell do you want?" I ask.

"You need to have a talk with your tribute," she says, voice huffy. "I passed her room and heard… noises. So I opened the door and found Nethan in her bed."

" _What_?" I get up and put on some clothes. "Were they fucking?"

Varinia rolls her eyes. "No, Finnick, they were holding hands and singing Kumbaya."

Sometimes this woman makes me wish I had my trident on me. "I'll speak to her," I say.

I find Annie sitting on her rumpled bed, knees pulled up to her chest, wearing pajamas that have been buttoned up wrong. When I step inside her room she ducks her head, blushing furiously.

"You don't need to lecture me," she says. "I know it was stupid."

"Damn right it was stupid," I say, more heatedly than I mean to. "What made you think it was a good idea to fuck your boyfriend four days before you have to fight him to the death?"

Annie glances up, cheeks still pink with embarrassment, and maybe anger. "Why are you even here? This isn't any of your business."

"You're my tribute. That makes it my business," I say.

"And you're my mentor," she snaps, "but you spend half your time screwing Capitol socialites instead of preparing me for the Games."

I look down and take a deep breath, maybe as ashamed as I've ever felt in my life. Annie isn't the first tribute to hate me for neglecting her, but she's the first to say as much.

"Besides, we didn't, you know, do _that_ ," she says. "Varinia caught us before—before he could…"

She sounds more relieved than anything, and a horrible thought begins to take shape in my mind. I step closer and ask quietly, "You did want him in your bed, didn't you, Annie?"

She doesn't answer for a long moment, and in a heartbeat the only thing I can think about is strangling Nethan until he's blue in the face. I know what it's like to have hateful hands on your body, and if that boy tried to hurt Annie like that I'll kill him before his Games get started.

Something of this must show on my face, because Annie shakes her head and says, "You've got the wrong idea! Nethan didn't force himself on me. I told him it was okay, because he wanted to so badly, but…"

My fury recedes as understanding takes its place. "But you didn't."

"He's everything to me, Finnick. My best friend in the whole world, the only family I've really got anymore, but I—I don't love him the same way he loves me." Tears brighten her green eyes, and she bites her bottom lip. "I'm horrible for not telling him the truth, aren't I?"

"No," I say gently. "Not at all. There's no point in hurting him."

Not when it won't matter in a few days' time.

* * *

The other Careers' training scores are fairly standard. Vita and Crispin, from District Two, each pull a typical ten, while Ruby from One is given a nine. The real news is Jasper, her district partner, who earns the first eleven that the Games have seen in five years (since my own). I wish I could say his score is inflated, but it's not. He's golden-haired and classically good-looking, almost as beautiful as I am—sponsor bait for certain. There's a dangerous edge to his white smile, and I can see in his blue eyes that he has what it takes to survive.

Tilla and Graft from District Three get a four and five, respectively, and then it's time for us. Nethan ties with District Two, earning a ten, and Annie manages a nine. Solid scores, great scores even, but the only thing the Games coverage focuses on is Jasper's eleven.

Maybe this should be irritating, but I only feel bad for the boy. If he wins, he'll end up just like me. At least he'll have company at home; District One has fewer victors than Two, but by far the most whores.

The rest of the scores are disappointing at best, and I can't help but wince when I see that Rolly, Haymitch's male tribute, only scraped a two.

"This is good," Mags says, and a small smile tugs at the corner of her mouth.

"How is this good? We got shown up by some District One slut," Varinia says, sniffing.

Mags gives our escort the sort of sharp look that reminds everyone in the room that she's still a victor. "It's good because nobody outside of the Career districts scored above a five. If the Gamemakers did their jobs right, it looks like there are no wildcards this year."

Promising tributes from exterior districts are uncommon but not unheard of, and most Games feature at least one or two. Without any serious outliers to contend with, things will be somewhat simpler for Annie and Nethan.

"Mags is right, but this also means you'll have to watch the other volunteers more closely," I say. "Without any challengers from outside the pack your alliance is likely to break down fast."

"Okay," Annie says. "We can do that."

Mags nods. "Keep an eye on District One in particular. The Twos are strong but they seem slow-witted."

"They're not," Annie says. She glances at Mags apologetically, like she's afraid to correct her. "Well, Vita isn't. I've talked to her quite a bit, and she might be a brute, but she's not stupid."

"Crispin's an idiot, though," Nethan says. "I can't believe his trainers picked him to volunteer."

"I can. That boy weighs two-fifty if he's an ounce," I say. "Don't underestimate him just because he isn't bright. Not every victor is intelligent."

"Obviously," Nethan says, smirking at me. "Some are just pretty."

I've been insulted and degraded by people far more intimidating than this boy, and I don't even bother to honor his slight with a response.

I don't have to anyway, because Annie punches him in the shoulder and says, "Stop it. You're acting childish."

"How can you defend him?" Nethan asks. "He's barely been around to help you get ready for the Games, and it doesn't take a genius to figure out what he's been doing instead—"

Mags points a finger at him. "Don't talk about things you don't understand."

"I understand well enough," Nethan says, glaring at me. "You've been too busy on your knees to take care of Annie. If she doesn't make it through these Games, it's your fucking fault."

Mags dismisses the tributes, and they both go their rooms. Once their doors slam shut, she sits next to me and says gently, "If she dies, it's Snow's responsibility. His and the Gamemakers' and whoever takes her life. But not yours, Finnick."

"Yeah, sure," I whisper, even though I know she's wrong.

* * *

Vibius has dressed Annie in flowing blue silk. Her hair is loose again, but wilder tonight. She's tall for a girl just this side of eighteen—taller than One and Two's female volunteers, even. Makeup highlights the long lines of her face, the straightness of her eyebrows and fullness of her mouth. Vibius left behind beautiful siren and turned her into something else entirely. An unknown element in the middle of familiar sights.

Caesar Flickerman smooths his ghastly hair, violently purple this year. He asks the general questions. How are you liking the Capitol? What's your plan for the arena? Anyone special in your life? At that one, I'm afraid she'll say something about Nethan, but Annie smiles, bites her lip, and glances in my direction. "No one at home, but maybe someone here," she says, and I don't know whether to be proud or angry that she's using me to draw sponsors.

She weaves her way around the rest of Caesar's questions, giving half answers more than whole. Coy and teasing when my name crops up. Whispers follow Annie back to her seat. The Capitol will remember her because they'll want to know more.

Now it's Nethan's turn, and Caesar asks what he thinks of the other tributes.

"We have a saying back home that I think sums it up: shooting fish in a barrel."

That's an idiom common enough for all of Panem to know, but considering our district's industry it's both clever and arrogant in exactly the way the Capitol loves. More of that and Mags will have sponsors eating from the palm of her hand.

Caesar leans forward when the laughing dies down. Intimate and conspiratorial, and I know what's coming next. "Annie certainly seems to be taking advantage of Finnick Odair's… _mentorship_. Have you?"

Cat calls come from the crowd, but Nethan handles it with grace. "Not really. I don't think he likes me very much."

"Why ever not?" Caesar asks. "A charming boy like you!" He invites the audience to respond, and he's met with an enthusiastic chorus of assent.

"Well, he is getting a little old now," Nethan explains soberly.

This has the Capitol howling. My extreme youth for a victor has been something of a national joke for the last five years. Cashmere loves to remind me that this is the first Games I'm actually too old to be Reaped for.

"I think he senses his star fading," Nethan continues, his mock seriousness replaced by sincerity. "It's time for someone to take his place."

"And you think that someone could be you?" Caesar asks.

He smiles, sharp as one of Annie's knives. "Drop a spear in the arena for me, and I'll make you forget you ever heard the name Finnick Odair."

They love it. They love _him_.

Nethan drinks in the Capitol's ever fickle adoration, full of pride and impending triumph, and I don't have the heart to tell him that of all the ways to win these Games, victory by love costs the most.

Afterward, Varinia toasts Nethan's brilliance and Annie presses a darting kiss to his cheek. Lip gloss leaves a wet fossil of her mouth on his skin, glistening just over his left dimple. For some reason I can't take my eyes off of that innocent mark, and I know that this moment—Nethan laughing and full of life, Annie's love tenderly tattooed so close to his mouth—will mingle with nets and blood and Capitol caresses, the pains I only see when I close my eyes. Something unfamiliar twists inside me, then releases: jealousy flexing, before I tell myself to let it go.


End file.
